Tuesday, June 17, 2008

Tom Junod and the Case of the Natural Born Killer

One of my favorite writers, Tom Junod, has written yet another riveting piece for Esquire, this one about a US solider that some call a natural born killer. In Iraq, was Michael Hensley just doing his job or something else altogether? "For a soldier at war, what is the difference between killing and murder?"

"Hensley was one of the most lethal snipers in the United States Army, and the most notorious. But he seemed less a lethal person than a person trapped in some kind of lethal drag. The rough-trade impression was accentuated by his hip-slung way of standing and by the shape of his body. He was hippy. He had gone from going to the gym three times a day to drinking pretty much all day. His hips were wider than his shoulders. He was also perfumed by the smell of alcohol working itself out of his body. His hands sometimes shook. So did everything else. He was twitchy and ticky. He couldn't keep still. He got up to go to the bathroom a lot. He had a lot of 'nervous behaviors,' he said. He was apologetic about them. His hands were a particular problem; he didn't know what to do with them. He jammed them in his pockets. He drummed his fingers against any available surface. He wiggled them in the air as though he were playing the flute. When he forgot about them, they'd curl up at the wrists until they looked palsied. The rest of his body would follow suit, his shoulders hunching over his hands in a kind of protective gesture until his body language was that of a man in shackles."

ABOUT

Susannah Breslin

I'm a freelance journalist. I've written for Details, Harper's Bazaar, Newsweek,
Radar, Women's Health, Salon, Slate, The Guardian, The Daily Beast, The LA Weekly, The San Francisco Chronicle, Variety, Inc., Esquire, The Atlantic, and I'm a Forbes contributor. In 2008, TIME named me one of the best bloggers of the year. I've appeared on CNN, NPR, and "Politically Incorrect." [EMAIL]